Pershing Square Retcon
Los Angeles
Angelenos have all experienced the effects of climate change. Cognitively, we know that California is under very dry conditions which leads to an increased risk of fires and limited water supply. But when lawns across the city are watered every day, people take long showers, and everyone acts without concern, it’s hard to stop and recognize why each of us should individually contribute to water conservation.
Given the magnitude of this drought problem, we urgently need accessible, engaging, and innovative public awareness campaigns that connect individuals with a deeper understanding of water conservation and promote behavior change to support these efforts.
An Augmented Reality Awareness Experience
Located in Pershing Square Park, a transportation hub at the heart of downtown Los Angeles, this virtual exhibition will be easily accessible to families, students, workers, commuters, technologists, artists, and conservationists.
“Pershing Square, the greenest space in a radius of tall buildings and skyscrapers, was famous for its iconic water fountain, which was meant to represent the aqueducts that bring LA its water.
Today, the fountain is bone dry.”
With this project, the same park that once held water as a reminder of these aqueducts, could again hold the opportunity to connect with our water sources and the importance of water conservation in an even grander and more meaningful way.
An Immersive Reminder
This exhibition will provide engaging and experiential education regarding water conservation in a fun and novel manner. While harnessing the potential of immersive technologies by using Augmented Reality (AR), we aim to create a city-scale virtual exhibition honoring water and focusing on the need to conserve. As visitors walk through the park, the park is brought to life with an augmented overlay celebrating the magnificence of water by depicting Southern California’s water sources in an artful way.
In addition, visitors will encounter a sequence of interactive stations where they will learn how climate change has impacted the ecosystems of these sources, about water sustainability and how they, as individuals, can play a role in ensuring future generations will have access to water.
Visitors will experience digital projections of Mono Lake’s magical crystalline salt structures, the infamous Sacramento water tower with it’s nearby lakes and forests, the Colorado River’s lingering path over the Hoover Dam in Las Vegas, and a digital reenactment of ground water filtration.
The seriousness of the message will be craftily interwoven with the novelty of the technology and necessary playfulness of the execution in order to entertain and delight. Visitors will witness the diversion of water from these sources to support Southern California’s water supply, see and hear the different exotic species made endangered due to these diversions, and glimpse two powerful versions of Lake Oroville and Lake Shasta—a before and after of the recent droughts that completely changed their landscape.
Appreciate. Inspire. Act.
Visitors will learn that there is hope. They will observe the ways in which our communities are attempting to restore these ecosystems and to create infrastructures for water sustainability. They will then discover how they can support these efforts.
Our goal is for visitors to gain a renewed level of appreciation for having access to water and inspire them to take action by being mindful of their usage and sharing this sentiment with others.
This project is an open transdisciplinary collaboration involving technologists and artists with different backgrounds coming together to share about this important cause through their ground-breaking work. Led by the design team Suzan Oslin and Laura Garcia from UXXR Design, other technology partners to date include Open AR Cloud, XRMasters, Augmented City, and Holo-Light. Invitations to include additional complimentary technologists and artists will continue.